Page 31 - AdNews Magazine Nov-Dec 2020

www.adnews.com.au | November-December2020 31
channel, one meeting, to another? We had a detailed plan that we've continued to change and adapt since. We engaged our staff and clients on that journey and they all bought into it.
“And we had a real sweet spot in the size of our business at 250 people. Small enough and nimble enough to move quickly and make quick decisions, but we had the scale to move campaigns and people internally to different parts of the business that were seeing increased demand.”
And so Bastion Collective came out of COVID-19 hiring. At the start of October, the agency had 14 new hires and was looking for another 20 roles to fill.
“What has held us in good stead from day one through COVID-19 is being independent with the ability to make quick decisions, while having the scale of 250 people globally and a completely integrated offering in house,” says Watts.
“This has meant we have been able to quickly shift client campaigns from one channel or discipline to another and have staff work across multiple parts of our business as demand has changed.
“Like most business owners, I have to be honest and say the first six weeks of COVID-19 were terrifying. I will always be incredibly grateful to our staff who dug in, came on the journey with us and put our clients' problems ahead of their own.”
Maintaining a steady eye
Ben Hill, the Melbourne-based marketing director of Mars Wrigley in Australia, started in his role about three weeks before lockdown.
Mars maintained ad spend on core brands but did shift emphasis, pausing with some brands.
“We've maintained the majority of our investment throughout this year,” he says. “So while a lot of industries and brands have needed to pull back, we've really maintained focus on what we call growth engine brands.
“We're firm believers in studies that show spending through a reces- sion is important. In some areas such as [chewing] gum, where we are
Left: Pivoting with
Mars Wrigley
Opposite page: Supporting the Melbourne International Comedy Festival
about 94 per cent of that cate- gory, if we were to stop spending then all that will happen is the category will shrink.”
The focus has been on M&M's, Maltesers and Extra. “We know there's room for growth on those brands so we believe it's crucial to invest in them and maintain that discipline rather than making reactive adjustments to our plan.”
Mars also went ahead with launches. “We did still have innovation this year as did most FMCG businesses,” says Hill.
“A big one was M&M's Pretzel. We maintained full-scale invest- ment behind that launch and we've seen great success on it.”
Mars did have to shift the messaging on some campaigns.
“One of the things we were very conscious of was not creating a bunch of vanilla ads that many companies were doing during the pandemic,” he says.
“We believe if a brand doesn’t have an authentic reason to say something, it really shouldn't.”
The Eclipse mints campaign was originally all about connec- tions. “As social connections dried